The Crawhall Collection is a wonderfully-diverse and visual collection of material by and relating to local businessman, artist and patron of the arts, Joseph Crawhall II (1821-1896). The published book portion of this collection comprises of 23 volumes and includes chapbooks, such as Olde ffrendes with newe faces (1883), A Jubilee Thought (1887) and Old Aunt Elspa's ABC [1884].

Previously, the Library housed a printing room, with working presses, which operated as a small publisher under the imprint 'Eagle Press'. The Eagle Press Collection contains facsimile reprints of printing manuals dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, together with the press' publications.

The Entomology Collection currently contains books on insects which were published between the late-Eighteenth and mid-Nineteenth Centuries, some of which have hand-coloured illustrations. The books are written in English, French or German, for the most part, with some in Latin.

The Fletcher Collection of books bequeathed by Professor G.B.A. Fletcher (1903-1995) of the Department of Classics, contains antiquarian editions of classical texts, written in Latin, Ancient Greek and in English translations.

Recognised authors, such as Livy, Cicero, Terence, Virgil, Aeschylus, Tacitus and Sophocles are all represented. Some of the books were produced by the early printing houses, the Aldine and Elzevier presses.

The Friends Collection has been built-up through purchases with funds from the Friends of the Library. It contains such rare books as Robert Boyle's Tracts: containing I. Suspicions about some hidden qualities of the air … (1674), J. Dryden's Albion and Albanius (1691), Some considerations on the consequences of the French settling colonies on the Mississippi: with respect to the trade and safety of the English plantations in America and the West-Indies (1720), various pamphlets by Thomas Paine and Edmund Burke, Newcastle songsters and other local material such as Report of the Orphan-House Sunday-School, Newcastle upon Tyne (1815-16). English literature is a particular strength of the collection.

This collection of early works on agriculture is rich in eighteenth and nineteenth-century reports on farming in many parts of Great Britain. The collection had as its nucleus the historical library of the late Professor D.A. Gilchrist (d. 1927), who held the Chair of Agriculture in Armstrong College from 1902 to 1927.

A collection highlight is William Billington's A series of facts, hints, observations, and experiments on the different modes of raising young plantations of oaks (1825) which demonstrates the common preoccupation of many early nineteenth-century estate owners with growing trees which would be suitable for use in shipbuilding.

The Grey Tracts reflect the interests of their former owner, the 2nd Earl Grey (1764-1845) whose Whig government was responsible for the 1832 Reform Act, 1833 Factory Act and the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act. The pamphlets cover a broad range of historical, social and economic subjects including colonial policy, public finance and banking, the Corn Laws and agriculture, poor relief, slavery, Catholicism, Ireland and the Greek Revolution.

The collection features 37 early 20th century first editions of short stories and novels by writer and activist Eleanor Luisa Haverfield: most are signed first editions and bear presentation inscriptions, very often addressed either to the author’s sister Dorothy or to other women.